This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: All neutron stars have intense magnetic fields. The typical magnetic field of a neutron star is about 100,000 times stronger than the strongest magnetic fields we can create on Earth.
But about 1% of neutron stars have even stronger magnetic fields. Known as magnetars, their magnetic fields can be 1,000 times stronger than a regular magnetic field. They are a likely cause of powerful transient events such as soft gamma-ray repeaters and fast radio bursts.
A new study looks at how magnetars might form. The findings are published on the arXiv preprint server. The work focuses on the mergers of binary neutron stars.
Often when two neutron stars collide, they form a black hole. This is because the combined mass of the two neutron stars is greater than the Tolman-Oppenheimer-Volkoff (TOV) limit, which is around 2.6 solar masses. Most neutron stars are more massive than white dwarfs, which have a Chandrasekhar limit of about 1.4 solar masses.
But some neutron stars have smaller masses. If they happen to have a total mass less than the TOV limit, then they can merge and become a single neutron star. Using high-resolution simulations run on the Japanese supercomputer FUGAKU, the team looked at the merger of low-mass neutron star binaries.
To simplify things a bit, they assumed stars with identical masses, but otherwise typical neutron stars. They assumed the magnetic field strengths of these stars were around 3 trillion gauss, which is in the upper range of typical neutron stars. Their simulations ran from just moments before the stars collide until just after.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
